Folk Museum Rogaška Slatina

The Folk Museum Rogaška Slatina is a private collection of Rogaška Slatina resident Nani Poljanec, who established the museum on the cult of his personality and interests. A performer, impersonator, manager, journalist, "etno pomp" artist, fashion designer, culinary ethnologist, poet, singer, photographer, culture manager, and collector, Poljanec has built his museum collection around his personal and family history and the early 20th-century history of the very famous Spa of Rogaška Slatina. In those times a lot of prominent guests enjoyed their retreats and health treatments there and left their mark on local people. In 2012 the museum moved in the newly built Anin dvor [Ana's Mansion] where the visitors can finally enjoy a permanent display.

Collection

The collection consists of more than 40 different sub-collections: hair samples, autographs and photos of famous people he met, political documents, money, old Tonka and Pelikan photos, oil paintings, sketches, sculptures, family pictures, poem collections, old books, old watches, objects by celebrities, etc. The Folk Museum Rogaška Slatina has the biggest private collection (documents, oil paintings, photos,...) of the Serbian and later old Yugoslav royal family of Karađorđevićs (1903–1941). Among the treasures include a group photo of the first Russian Cosmonauts with original signatures and a letter from Nikola Tesla.

Nani Poljanec - ljudski ustvarjalec by maresok on YouTube

Museum's public exhibitions

The Folk Museum had the first public presentation in Rogaška Slatina in the Old Post Office building in 2005. Outside of Rogaška Slatina Nani Poljanec presented the collections in Ljubljana in the Cabinet of the Domestic Research Society (2006) and in the Celje Museum of Recent History (2009).

Nani Poljanec's active and diverse way of life is also mirrored in the fact that the museum is currently in his private house in Rogaška Slatina. His cabinet study is small, but cosy, filled with so many precious objects which are only a small part of his big collection, that he has to store everywhere in his private home. His mission was to donate his private collections to the people of Rogaška Slatina and to establish a public museum that would properly store and present all what his museum has to offer. This came true in 2012.

Events and activities

Personality

Nani Poljanec organised the first concert of the group Laibach in Rogaška Slatina in 1993 with a set of public performances called Blacksmiths of Future. He is the manager of Teofil Milenković, a wunderkind musician who already had solo violin concerts when he was 6 years old. Nani impersonated Don Vito Corleone (Marlon Brando) from Godfather I in the Hri-bar Show (2004-2010), a satiric evening programme on Slovenian National Television. As Don Corleone singing the song Bella mia he participated in the 2007 competition to represent Slovenia at Eurovision and almost won.

As performer he had performance marathon of 48 hours in Kulturni Dom Rogaška Slatina with concerts, talks, plays, and presentations. He published the first Slovenian book on philography (the collecting of autographs).

The catalogue of the philographic collection (of autographs) of the Folk Museum Rogaška Slatina, 2008

Folk Faculty

Nani Poljanec established his own educational system and the Folk Faculty, where he is simultaneously the only student, professor, and rector. After every project he publicly gives himself a grade. Nani Poljanec aims to get a Majgisterij (as opposed to a Magisterij or master's degree) for Folk Art and Creation on 10 different subjects which derive from all of his interests. He plans to conclude his studies and end his life project in 2069, when he will be 101 years old and will become a Ph.D. on Folk Art and Creation.

KunstHaus Top Sekret Gallery

In 2011 with a group of friends and collaborators, Nani Poljanec established the exhibition space and salon, KunstHaus Top Sekret Gallery, for local intellectuals from the fields of "low" and "high" culture at a secret location. KunstHaus publishes its own fanzine with contributions in various languages.

International contacts

Nani Poljanec is Rogaška Slatina's cultural attaché and has close relations with descendants of the Serbian royal family of Karađorđevićs. In 2009, on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the murder of King Alexander Karađorđević (1934), he exhibited his collection as a guest of honour in the family's mansion in Oplenac, Serbia.

External links

Nani Poljanec and his Folk Museum on YouTube (in Slovenian)
Folk Museum's Krađorđević collection on Kamra.si
Philographic Collection of Nani Poljanec on YouTube
Ljudski muzej Nanija Poljanca in the Cabinet of the Domestic Research Society (in Slovenian)
Hri-bar Show web pages (in Slovenian)
Bella Mia on EMA contest for Eurovision Song (2007)

Gallery

Nani Poljanec, alias Don V. Corleone, in the Hri-bar Show, a satirical evening programme on Slovenian National Television, 2007

Nani Poljanec alias Aleksander Stanislav Jurkovič (1968 – 2069)

The unveiling of the portrait of Petar II Karađorđević painted by Ivanka Bukovac in 1936. The picture was purchased for the Folk Museum Rogaska Slatina collection by Nani Poljanec and 250 donators, January 2010. (From left to right: Manca Izmajlova, Attanasie Milenković, Nani Poljanec and Predrag Filipov, the Ambassador of the Republic of Serbia in Slovenia)

Nani Poljanec and Jani Pirnat, art historian (Domestic Research Society), presenting the first volume of the KunstHaus fanzin at Račka Gallery in Celje, 2011

Nani Poljanec, owner and author of the local cultural heritage collection, presenting the museum installation of Ivan Zagoda's shoemaker tools to the donator Milan Zagoda, Folk Museum Rogaška Slatina at Ana's Mansion, 2012

Nani Poljanec with the guests of the 24-hour piano playing marathon with 50 participants, coorganised by Poljanec at the Cristal Hall of the Rogaška Hotel, July 2012.

An autograph of Stefan Milenković, a Serbian child prodigy and famous concert violinist, his first violin and a frock coat. Part of the Philographic Collection of the Folk Museum Rogaška Slatina at Ana's Mansion, 2012

A display cabinet with healing mineral water bottles (the oldest ones made of clay) and old bottle labels. Folk Museum Rogaška Slatina at Ana's Mansion, 2012

Corleone brajdovec penina, a sparkling wine produced in cooperation with the company Vina Mijošek. The money from the sales of it was given to the victims of the Železniki flood, Folk Museum Rogaška Slatina

The Crown Prince Aleksandar Aleksandrov Karađorđević, Hereditary Prince Petar Aleksandrov Karađorđević, and the collector Nani Poljanec (of the Folk Museum Rogaška Slatina) at the State Funeral (in which the remains of the Serbian and Yugoslav Royal House of Karađorđević were buried in Oplenac Mausoleum in Topola, Serbia), 2013.

Some artefacts from the Folk Museum of Nani Poljanec, Rogaška Slatina, as displayed in 2006 in The Cabinet of the Domestic Research Society

For a long time, the Folk Museum of Nani Poljanec, Rogaška Slatina was more or less a privately-held collection. In 2006, a part of it was displayed in The Cabinet of the Domestic Research Society.